#blatant speculation

[thewrongexecution]

FFXIV Class Concept: Oracle

Because I should probably put my fancy ideas that at least some of you will enjoy reading somewhere other than youtube comments every now and then. Save 'em for posterity or whatever.

This post will make more sense if you're familiar with the Shadowbringers Normal Raid series, as it reuses concepts seen therein.

The Oracle is a caster-melee hybrid (classified as Caster DPS) which wields a Gavel (a one- or two-handed blunt-force melee weapon which fires spells from the pommel). It focuses on dealing damage in large but less-frequent bursts, while planning ahead to deal even greater burst damage during the appropriate buff windows.

Oracle's core class feature is Spell-in-Waiting, a single-use self-buff which alters the function of certain spells, similar to Sage's Eukrasia. Activating Spell-in-Waiting makes your next basic spell cast instantly, but apply as a debuff which detonates after ~6 seconds.

Casting a basic spell at an enemy afflicted with Spell-in-Waiting will enhance the Waiting spell based on the elements of the spells involved. Oracle eventually gains access to Dark, Light, and Unaspected damage types, which are each associated with particular effects.

Normally, the spells just do raw damage, but striking an enemy afflicted with a Waiting spell may change how the spell detonates, applying AoE patterns, healing, buffs, or debuffs.

Thus, the rotation runs:

Spell-in-Waiting > basic spell

basic spell (enhances Waiting)

melee strike (modifies, detonates Waiting)

...Which I think is a fairly unique combat flow. You're encouraged to stay in melee range (though any number of other mechanics, such as healer AoE sizes, already do), and become vulnerable right before your burst goes off (basic spells have a default 2-second cast time, to purposefully ratchet that tension and grant the satisfaction of the spell and melee hit going off near-simultaneously).

In addition to an expanding elemental repertoire, Oracle also gains Stock Strike, which stores a copy of a Spell-in-Waiting for future use. This could be cast on its own, but would optimally be used to create a third-stage Spell-in-Waiting (operating on Monk chakra rules, you'd want either monotype or omnitype for optimal results).

Please do not ask me how quickcast interacts with this kit.

[thewrongexecution]

okay so I have work in the morning and laundry to put away and will probably gotta snack somewhere in there as well so This Is of course The Perfect Time to reprise and refine the incoherent ramble I've given twice now on stream

this post will contain spoilers for P5 basegame, royal, and strikers, and some early-game spoilers for tactica. tread lightly if you still care about any of that.

let's talk Lavenza.

rewinding to her first appearance at the end of P5, two major factors immediately establish themselves that set her apart from other velvet residents:

she is as much a victim of abuse as any of the other PThieves. Yaldy's got gaslight gatekeep girlboss on lock, obviously, but the whole bisection thing is... is that physical abuse? lobotomization? some kind of violence upon the soul itself? fucked up, is what it is.

The whole squad knows she exists. Setting aside Morgana's personal connection to her, she's this weird lonely girl they found in superjail. Obviously circumstances were dire enough at the time that they couldn't, like, hang out. but like, it's implied in Strikers that Joker still hasn't explained how the velvet room works to anyone. did she never come up in conversation again? did they all just Amnesia her the moment she stepped out of frame?

the next closest velvet resident, in both narrative and thematic resonance and chronological proximity, is P4G's Marie, and they built a whole fuckin' storyline around her. so when Igor dips at the end of P5, then stayed dipped during Third Semester, leaving Lavenza to manage the velvet room all alone, well. my brain started churning. was she just. in charge now? was the space between dream and reality and mind and matter under new management?

I know you like a good overworked office lady, and that's rubbed off into my specific vision of an older lavenza in some future mainline Persona: stuck behind that blue desk, books strewn about, coffee pot hissing in the back, eyebags, frayed hair, the works. so when I heard Strikers was a genuine sequel, which still didn't seem to contain Igor? in that moment of clarity, Haru dropped to my second favorite character in the game.

hey. you know how our good friend pita wrote an extremely good fic lamenting atlus' failure to capitalize on narrative themes and character backstories in Strikers? well Let's! Talk! Lavenza!

in Strikers- the summer vacation game, deliberately intended to be a lighter-hearted power fantasy about friends having fun on a roadtrip together, Lavenza is:

sad,

a menu.

y'hear that?

that's the sound of incredible disappointment supercompressing into loathing and vitriol!

she doesn't get to hang out! with the cool people she cares about! they don't give her an Elizabeth bit where you can socialize with a weirdo disconnected from physical reality in various humorous circumstances! it's all I'm Sorry, Trickster this or I'm Amazed, Trickster that. living plot summary and walking talking UI interface, except she hardly walks talks or lives at all.

atlus, true to form, squanders yet another opportunity.

recently, someone tweeted some concept art of Tactica's leblanc. here are those images.

they were posted in this order, suggesting they were drawn in this order. the second one contains a new playable character. the first one contains Lavenza. the new playable character is called "Elle" in Japanese. Lavenza sends you a letter in the game which, on inspection, is sealed with wax stamped with a stylized "L".

did something happen between point A and B? was there a decision to replace one with the other? are there artifacts of an earlier time yet unmodified to save time and budget? Erina first shows up heavily clothed to obscure her features, but only briefly. yet, that swathed figure shows up- briefly- in the OP that plays whenever you turn on the game. was her identity meant to remain hidden for longer? would that have mattered more if her identity was different?

Lavenza has a new outfit in Tactica, featuring a leather apron and and welder's visor. she also, per Fusion Accidents in P5 and Royal, has a chainsaw. so an outfit change, a mask, and a melee weapon which all fit a certain fictional aesthetic (slasher villain). if she had a gun, she'd have everything she'd need to be a phantom thief, right? well I don't think she's been seen with a flamethrower, but it'd match the aesthetic, compliment the heavy machinery of the chainsaw, and wouldn't even be that out of place in her new forge.

do you see. do you get it. I am going insane and so I just don't! think about it! because the possibility! however faint! is not yet zero!!!

I'm going to stream all of Tactica if I can, so I might not reach confirmation for any of this for a while. I'm pretty sure she'll reunite with the Thieves proper whenever The Train rolls in? but god knows when that'll be.

oi. ATLUS. if she's not playable yet. I'm the idiot who'd shell out for that DLC. make it happen.

(playable lavenza truther voice) what do you mean erina used to be called L. what do you mean. what do you mean. wh

i have performed the 15 seconds of research required to obtain the answer. disregard previous message.

no no keep talking, bring us into your beautiful mind

[mysterious-shelf]

guys i’m thinking…thinking thoughts…the promo shows a fire breaking out on the plane… and they specifically showed the hole at the back getting bigger…and tbh that hole has to be a chekhov’s gun because why even put it there in the first place…

and now i’m picturing hen, chim, eddie and tommy going rogue again, stealing a helicopter and rappelling down through the hole to put the fire out…..here’s how the airport 1975 theory can still happen 🤓

[eddiespornstache]

2x01: “You could have my back any day.”

“Yeah. Or, you know, you could … you could have mine.”

//////

2x07: “What did you need that I didn’t give you?”

… “I needed someone to have my back!”

[total-drama-brainrot]

What do you think of the Heather was kept in the game by the producers for ratings/drama theory?

What do you mean, theory? That's literally canon.

In World Tour, at least. Heather's contunied "survival" through Island is mostly happenstance and, from a meta standpoint, plot armour, but in-universe it's mostly a lot of coincidences resulting in her not being voted out from her team.

In World Tour? The only thing keeping Heather around was the fact that her team always seemed to miraculously lose when that episode's challenge was a rewards challenge.

Alejandro's sabotaging of Team Victory helped out with that a bit, but a lot of Heather's "luck" in World Tour fell solely on the shoulders of the producers wanting to keep her around. She's a conflict generator, the conflict generator, and that paired with her looks and her entertaining personality make her a "rating's jewel". Of course they want to keep her around for as long as possible, and it just so happens that Chris already established that rewards challenges won't be disclosed until after the losers were determined. Ergo, should Heather's team lose and inevitably vote her off, Chris can just claim it was a rewards challenge the whole time.

It's not just that though. There's other, smaller instances of favouritism towards Heather in World Tour that lend credence to this.

Her team got lost in the Amazon? The "zing-zings" worship her as a goddess and, oh, give her a golden tooth to replace the one Leshawna knocked out of her mouth the previous episode - convenient that they would go out of their way to "fix" Heather's appearence, it's almost as if her looks are a big part of her appeal (in-universe) and therefore the show's viewership.

Chris outright tells Alejandro that he's not allowed to have DJ join their team, but has no qualms about Heather cozying up to him throughout Newfoundland - implying he was more than happy for Heather to recruit DJ (a known strong contestant) to her side, making her elimination more unlikely.

This isn't so much a theory as it is just looking deeper at the source material itself; the dots areall there, and it takes very little effort to connect them. The producers wanted to keep Heather around because she's good for ratings and good at causing drama - the show's whole brand. In doing so enabled her antagonist-to-antihero arc against Alejandro which only generated more audience engagement (and consequently avenue) and incentivisined them to keep pulling strings to ensure she stayed on the show for as long as possible.

[justacrazylilguy]

To The Metal Gear Fandom

Okay so silly question but i see a lot of yall on here and you say all the homoerotic stuff in mgs is canon right? Especially otasune, bbkaz, bosselot. Not to sound like a hater but the first game came out in 1998. You know what age hideo Kojima was back then? 36 with a wife and kids. So what's his real purpose for making a whole game series about a buncha gay guys? That's what leads me to believe it's unintentional but idk. If he said why then lmk cause I dont get why he would? I've been thinking about this a lot recently because I've been seeing a lot of people saying it's deliberate. Anyone can answer btw my askbox is open because i Need an explanation. More in tags cause im insane.

[bugsbenefit]

anytime people reblog my hellfire s5 post i can go back to being amazed that they made TWO separate hellfire photo props and how they deliberately switched to a version that includes Dustin, Lucas, and Mike for all the wanted posters, instead of sticking to the presumably older yearbook picture we see them have at first

for reference: the hellfire club photo we get first, with Eddie and the members of his band, but also others like the people on the right who presumably graduated

and the hellfire photo we see during Jason's speech for the first time, now featuring the party, which also ends up plastered on the wanted posters in places like the gun store

like, damn, they really went out of their way to make two separate yearbook photo props and showed Jason deliberately went out of his way to find a newer photo to include all of current hellfire for his satanism speech accusing them of ritualistic murder. man did his research

and how that alone already shows how important it was to even the prop department to drag the party into the hellfire mess headfirst since they already had a photo of Eddie in hellfire Jason could have used. but no

they deliberately update to a version including the party

it's just such a fun detail to me bc it's such a background thing too. they just switch to a photo of modern day hellfire when Jason starts accusing the whole club instead of just Eddie, no big deal. with the only exception being the party being on them, since it's their first year in higschool. that change was really for them wasn't it, so fun to me

[orcelito]

Actually it bothers me so much when people in fandom refer to a pregnant trans man as a "mother" or "mommy". Like for fucks sake guys, that's a man. And yknow, when reading through that subreddit for pregnant trans men, some of them mentioned that they Do go by "mom" or "mama" with their kids, but others expressed visceral discomfort with it!!! Which ultimately, it's the individual's choice regarding what they're comfortable with, but if You, a Cis Person, are equating a man being pregnant to him being "feminine" (aka a Mother), then that's a fucking Problem.

I might have to include a disclaimer on my own trans pregnancy fic to Not Fucking Call Him Mom. Or it's on fucking Sight.

[freakwiththeknifecollection]

It's kinda laughable to me when people bring up Meg telling Jo that Dean only saw her as a little sister as like, definitive proof that's how he felt. Like demons never lie just to fuck with people

[rabbits-of-negative-euphoria]

So I’m curious about your post about fiction that changed you! Noragami is one of my favorite shows so I’m interested in what about it affected you? (hope it was a positive change lol!)

It was! Like the song Suffering Servant, I think Noragami was really instrumental in turning my thoughts away from endless rationalizations of God’s existence and toward the Cross. There’s a reason it’s very popular among Christian anime fans (though that reputation developed after I had watched it, and I had actually put off watching it because—not yet knowing much about modern Japanese culture—I was afraid it would be wrong to watch a show starring the Shinto gods).

I think it would be very difficult for any Christian to watch Yukine sin ruthlessly while Yato takes the physical blight for each misdeed—willing to suffer even unto death to cleanse Yukine of the evil that will otherwise condemn him (and seemingly purely out of a love Yukine has not earned)—and not be utterly bowled over by a wave of gospel parallels, no matter how dry your wells of faith seem to be.

And there’s also the sanctification-esque dynamic wherein Yato sees Yukine floating along, claims him, gives him a name, and then not only makes him a formidable weapon, but hones Yukine into a better weapon over time by nurturing a relationship with him. (Obviously, Yato is also a deeply flawed individual, so this is sometimes a two-way street, but the effect is still so striking.)

At 17, I needed to forget the intricacies of doctrine that had me tied in existential knots and look instead to the Cross where all my doubts and despair had been forgiven, and Noragami was like a spoon stirring my brains around to be primely positioned for that eventual leap of faith.

[chronicowboy]

that video of the rain and the ambulances at night is most likely from episode 10 in a flash right? before episode 11 in another life which i'm assuming by the names are going to be linked in some way even if its not obvious at first and we've all theorised about in another life being our coma! buck dreams coming true so i listened to the audio and you can hear bobby shouting orders to hen and chim, you can hear hen shouting at people to get out of her way i think, and chim shouts "come on, eddie", and i'm pretty sure its the same place where they were all wearing wetsuits and there was oliver with a stunt double in a buckley turnout coat, maddie with the 118, albert, buck's loft, gavin in what might be a hospital waiting room.... i'm not saying this means coma! buck, but... this means coma! buck. and then the eddie of it all! the "come on, eddie" does eddie see buck get hurt and shut down in his grief? because as much as i'd love to see eddie scream for buck, i think it could be just as painful to watch him crumble as he realises thay buck is truly hurt. and now that spinning camera video, it could be buck's dreams maybe, or it could be eddie passing out in the hospital and then the next episode we can't decide whether the dreams are eddie's or buck's. much to think about.

[pebbledrat]

I am like 86% sure the yaoi bit started bc aimee wanted to call scott and ran surviving longer in hole in the wall a "yaoi win"

[daniclaytcn]

This is the first time i'm honestly interested in how the good old ga interpreted the episode...Like we know our best friends here on tumblr will have a post out in no time about how they are "JuST lIKe thAt wiTH [tHEir] fRIends", but the ga doesn't make an effort to no-homo every scene, they take things at face value.

frankly, i don't think that in the event of buddie going canon, it would take a lot to convince the GA that it's realistic or whatever. 911 has had a bunch of queer couples and queer storylines, and while yes, two previously assumed to be straight male characters getting together would be a different beast, i still don't think it would like. be as big of a dealbreaker as some people assume it to be. even if they don't start making it super obvious for the GA before getting them together, a simple montage of their development through the show might do the trick to clue the GA in, just as they have their first kiss or love confession or whatever. and s6 does love it's montages.

[pochapal]

interesting here that alongside maria battler is also immediately able to identify the first of the golden witch's omens.

[nexus-nebulae]

was watching a video on how shit the pocahontas movie is and thinking about the mystification of native americans in media and how they're usually shown to be serious, quiet, and typically not very emotive- i have just realised that i cannot imagine a native american child being silly and having fun because i've literally never seen that before and that is so fucked

[put-me-out-of-my-destiny]

I just finished God Of War (2018), and man, it feels good to enjoy an action game I would actually recommend to people for once